Baruch and the Jews in Babylon

¹These are the words that Baruch son of Neriah, son of Mahseiah, son of Zedekiah, son of Hasadiah, son of Hilkiah, wrote in Babylon.

²He wrote it on the seventh day of the month during the fifth year after the Babylonians captured Jerusalem and destroyed it by fire.[#1:2a Greek Chaldeans.; #1:2b The first capture of Jerusalem occurred in 597 b.c. The city was captured again and burned in 586 b.c.]

³Baruch read this book to Jehoiachin son of Jehoiakim, the king of Judah, and to all the people who came to hear it.[#1:3 Greek Jeconiah, a variant name for Jehoiachin; also in 1:9.]

⁴He also read it to the nobles, the princes of Judah, the elders, and everyone else, from the least to the greatest, who lived in Babylon by the Sud River.

⁵When the people heard what Baruch wrote, they wept, fasted, and prayed to the Lord.

⁶Then they collected all the money they could afford to give

⁷and sent it to Jerusalem to the high priest, Jehoiakim son of Hilkiah, son of Shallum, and to the other priests, and to all the Jews who were still with them in Jerusalem.

⁸At about this time in early summer, Baruch recovered the silver utensils that had been looted from the Temple, in order to return them to the land of Judah. Zedekiah son of Josiah, the king of Judah, had made these silver utensils[#1:8 Greek On the tenth day of Sivan, of the ancient Hebrew lunar calendar. The year is not specified, but this date usually occurs in June.]

⁹after Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, had deported Jehoiachin, the princes, the skilled workers, the nobles, and other people from Jerusalem and had taken them as captives to Babylon.[#1:9 As in Syriac version (see also Jer 24:1); Greek reads the prisoners.]

¹⁰They sent this message to the people in Jerusalem:

Instruction for Confession of Sins